I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve heard the same question after an earthquake, whether in a community talk or an institutional meeting: “does getting under a desk actually work?” Working as a technical infrastructure advisor for Cali’s Secretaría para la Gestión del Riesgo de Emergencias y Desastres, I learned that the gap between what people believe protects them and what structurally protects them is real — and that closing it, with clear information rather than generic pamphlets, matters as much as any seismic calculation. This isn’t another recycled checklist. It’s, as much as possible, an explanation of why each action actually works.

Before: preparation

Preparation starts long before the shaking begins, and most of it comes down to reducing loose mass near where people actually spend time:

  1. Identify the structurally safest spots in every space you occupy: next to columns, under sturdy beams, away from glass façades and tall unanchored furniture.
  2. Anchor shelving, cabinets, and heavy objects to the wall — most injuries in moderate earthquakes don’t come from structural collapse, they come from falling objects.
  3. Know your family’s meeting point and keep a basic kit (water, flashlight, radio, copies of key documents) accessible without relying on electricity.
  4. If you live in a multi-story building, ask whether a seismic vulnerability study exists, or at least whether the building complies with the NSR-10 code in effect when it was built — an uncomfortable question, but the most relevant one of all.

During: what to do in the moment

This is where structural physics actually matters. The international technical recommendation — duck, cover, and hold — isn’t an arbitrary convention: ducking lowers your profile and your risk of losing balance as the ground moves; covering under sturdy furniture protects you from debris and falling objects, which are the most common cause of injury; holding on keeps the furniture from shifting away and leaving you exposed.

What you shouldn’t do — and what I still see in practice — is run for the exit during strong shaking, especially in multi-story buildings. Stairs are, structurally, one of the most vulnerable elements under the differential displacement between floors, and running down them during an earthquake multiplies your fall risk against a total-collapse risk that’s much lower in a structure properly designed under NSR-10. The code requires the structure to dissipate energy without collapsing under the design earthquake — that doesn’t mean there’s no damage, but it does mean the regulation’s whole point is literally to buy you time so you’re not on a staircase when the shaking is strongest. Knowing that earthquake early-warning systems can give a few seconds of notice before strong shaking arrives also changes the logic: those seconds are for protecting yourself where you are, not for running outside.

After: what to check before going back in

Once the shaking stops, the temptation is to go straight back to routine. Before re-entering a building, it’s worth looking with an engineer’s eye, not just common sense:

  • New diagonal cracks in masonry walls, especially X-shaped ones, which indicate concentrated shear stress.
  • Columns with spalled concrete cover or visible reinforcement — a sign the column worked close to its capacity.
  • Visible out-of-plumb lean: a building that no longer looks “plumb” may have damage to its seismic resisting system even without collapsing.
  • Gas smell, exposed live wiring, or uncontrolled running water — secondary risks that are just as real as structural damage itself.

If there’s any reasonable doubt, the technical and institutional recommendation agree: don’t re-enter until a qualified professional assesses the structure. That formal damage assessment, at neighborhood or city scale, follows a standardized methodology worth knowing even if you’re not an engineer.

Closing

No protocol replaces an engineer’s judgment evaluating real conditions on the ground, but a clear protocol drastically reduces the odds of the wrong call in the seconds that actually matter. That combination — clear protocol plus real technical judgment — is, in the end, exactly what any well-designed risk-management system is built on.